Gluten free views and reviews for Bristol and West Cornwall.

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Caffe Clifton, Bristol

A few weeks ago a friend and I arranged to meet up and after a quick bit of research, I discovered that Caffe Clifton offered gluten free cakes, so I thought this would be a nice venue for a catch up.

I must admit that I used to live a few roads away from this café, but I didn’t know it existed, despite knowing the location of the Clifton Hotel, which the café is part of!

The first thing to say about the location of the café is that it’s not very pushchair friendly, as both paths to the entrance have steps, and one path has slabs and gravel which again is not too practical for a pushchair. Aside from that the café is in a lovely setting in Clifton with a nice grassy outdoor area.

Once inside it was decision time, what was I going to eat?! However, the options were a little easier as there were only two gluten free cake options, a jewel bar or a chocolate praline cluster. The latter was recommended by the staff, so I opted for this at a cost of £1.85, which seemed quite reasonable.

Drink wise I feel like I’m a bit of a nightmare as my preferred hot drink is a hot chocolate and I am very aware that lots of leading brand hot chocolates are not gluten free, so this is something I always check when ordering. In some cases, I’ve had responses of ‘I can’t see why it wouldn’t be’, so when I explain that lots of leading brand ones aren’t, staff seem quite shocked.

In the case of Caffe Clifton, the staff weren’t sure so they sought out the hot chocolate tin and the ingredients looked ok, so I ordered one. If staff aren’t aware if something contains gluten, I prefer that they do at least check the packaging rather than making an assumption.

Unfortunately there seemed to be a problem with the tills so it took quite a while to pay, but once sorted we went and sat at a small table by the door. The seating area is quite small and as you are also effectively in the reception area of a hotel, it didn’t have a normal coffee shop feeling.

My friend and I both thoroughly enjoyed our drinks and cakes. My cake was very brownie like, but the chocolate chunks and praline gave it a really nice texture. It was also really moist, which I know is difficult to do with gluten free cakes so this was also a bonus.

Although it was great that Caffe Clifton offered two gluten free cake options, it would be nice if there were a few more and it’d also be great if brownie type products weren’t standard in every coffee shop. Some varieties would be nice 🙂

Overall I would recommend Caffe Clifton for it’s lovely drinks and cakes and as they have recently started selling ice cream made by Chew Moos (who are based just outside Bristol), I’ll definitely be going back to try some of these out, especially white chocolate and honeycomb, wow!

For more information about Caffe Clifton, visit their website (www.caffeclifton.co.uk) and you can also find them on Twitter (@thecaffeclifton).